Friday, 30 March 2012

I'm pleased to say that Ordinary Domestic: Collected Short Stories is now available as an e-book for Kindle. Published by PotHole Press, this collection brings together the stories I've had published in various magazines over the years and makes them available again, and all together. There's 'Unrestricted', which was a finalist in the big Macallan/Scotland on Sunday Short Story Competition, and there's 'Marion', which was my very first publication - in Cencrastus, a Scottish literary magazine - way back in 1999. 'Frozen Waste', which was the opening story in the first edition of prestigious magazine Gutter, is there, too. Some of my favourite unpublished stories are also in the collection. Which one's your favourite?

PotHole Press is a new venture, set up and run by Keith McKay, my partner. He's looking for submissions of literary fiction primarily and has expressed a particular interest for collections of literary short stories. My views on this? Well, I'm delighted he's published my short stories and I really appreciate the skill and talent he's lavished on it. He believes that standards in e-book publishing should be every bit as high as those we expect from print publishing - and by that he means the reputable, big publishers. It's disappointing if an author has spent years polishing their work only to have it mangled by self-publishing it as a pdf on an e-book reader. Keith's standards are high and that's in the author's favour.

As for the whole e-publishing phenomenon, I'm all for it. The publishing industry is in a period of upheaval. E-publishers and Print-On-Demand publishers are the SMEs of the publishing world and like any other small to medium enterprise they bring a new zest and vitality to the industry. They're prepared to put in the hours and take risks - to find, prepare and market good writing. But what about quality when everyone who's ever written is able to publish their own manuscript via POD or e-book? This is where the difference will lie. And this is where we still need publishers like The PotHole Press, whose tag-line is 'We take pride in our e-books'.

You can also go to Carol's publisher's web site potholepress.co.uk and click on the "What We Do" tab. There, you can find links to software readers, such as the Kindle e-reader software, which can be installed on a pc, mobile phone, Apple mac, or iPad.

If you buy the e-book (a bargin at £3.31!), and you like the stories, it would be nice if you could put up a review on Amazon.

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About Me

Writer and university teacher of creative writing. Winner, Robert Louis Stevenson Fellowship, 2010, and of the inaugural Booktown Writers' Short Story Competition, 2012. My short fiction has been published in magazines Gutter, Chapman, Mslexia and others, anthologised by Birlinn and Luath and featured in newspapers The Herald and The Telegraph. Co-wrote 'As I lay me down to sleep', a biography of Eileen Munro, published by Mainstream in 2008. 'Ordinary Domestic: collected short stories' published by Pothole Press, 2012.
Lover of all things wild and natural. Believe what Blake said, i.e. 'Everything that lives is holy.'